Piemonte Handmade 2015

Within Operæ 2015, the exhibition “HERE/NOW– I/WE. Piemonte Handmde”

collected the projects born from the collaboration of twelve Piedmont artisans and twelve Italian designers.

The 2015 edition of Piemonte Handmade project rises from two announcement of selection. The first one, aimed at providing an opportunity for growth to emerging talents of the Italian design scenario, allowed Operæ to identify two designers under 28 to be added to the ten selected established designer.

The second one, launched by the Region of Piedmont, was aimed at identifying twelve artisanal companies in the Piedmont area that participated in the initiative through the collaboration with the twelve designers.

The result, showcased in an exhibition within the venue of Palazzo Cavour, is a variety of products, which are strongly connected to a contemporary dimension and in which we can easily grasp the historical roots and cultural backgrounds.

The initiative was financed by the Development and Cohesion Fund 2007-2013.
The following texts by Angela Rui – curator of Operæ 2015 – are extracts of the exhibition catalogue.

Cattedrale Cabinets

Designer: Antonio AricòArtigiano: Soheila Dilfanian, Il vetro d’Arte

[Wardrobe cabinet, console cabinet and corner cabinet]

By using the process of making leaded mosaic stained-glasses, the immediate and emphatic collaboration between Aricò and Dilfanian has brought to life the collection Cattedrale Cabinets. The three pieces, made of three different colour gradients, can be considered as furnishing sculptures: the transparency of the glass makes the “guarded” content almost visible, while its colour reacts to light, giving off a shimmering reflection all around the environment.

Castagno

Designer: Carlo ContinArtigiano: piccola falegnameria

[Table]

The object chosen by Carlo Contin is a table, one of the archetypal element of dwelling, which he visually sectioned in a transversal way turning it into a tool for discussing about the two different approaches to production. The first one finds its plot in the type of wood – chestnut, a very warm wood used for making rustic furniture, in the visible joints used for fixing the countertop to the support stand, and in the manual planning of one half of the countertop, creating an uneven surface that resembles the bark of a tree. The second instead finds its plot, other than on the opposite half of the top, pulled by a machine, in the overall design of the piece that appears deliberately rational and geometric. The diagonal of the beam that joins the legs is symmetrical but opposite to that of the axes, creating an object with a “dynamic” design, that is a metaphor for a situation of continuous exchange between hand and machine.

Cover

Designer: Chiara OnidaArtigiano: Alta Moda Anna Giroli

[Blanket]

Chiara Onida brought the cover to its original meaning, the object that warms up, protects, shelters, by reaching its archetypal in terms of covering object. Cover is a blanket, functional artifact and common ritual to all cultures, inside which are collected ancient and modern materials, and turns timeless at last. The fur, treated according to different handmade processing, draws some sensory moments that remain hidden on the inner surface of the object.

Illo Tempore. Tempo, Diavolo, Dio.

Designer: Federico FlorianiArtigiano: Verbano Velluti

[Velvet cloaks]

Illo Tempore, Latin expression for "that far away time one hardly remembers" is the title given to the collection of three cloaks designed by Federico Floriani.In Temple, the subject is related to the temperance, that is the act of alchemical transmutation that leads vital spirit into matter and makes permanent what’s variable and stable what’s unstable. Devil brings together a collection of alchemical signs that administers the natural occurrences as well as the psychic energy, and at last God, whose omnipotence and ascetic ability is given by the synergy between animals, plants and architecture.

Libroinfinito

Designer: Giulio IacchettiArtigiano: Alberto Tallone Editore

[Book]

Libroinfinito is a book designed to occupy a privileged place in homes. Its spine lies in the center of the object and separates the sextodecimos into two identical parts, turning it into an “infinite” and circular reading experience. Its content has to be invented, a world to imagine, ordered by an Abbecedery printed with Tallone’s type and signature.

Greetings from...

Designer: JoeVelluto (JVLT)Artigiano: Roberto Figurelli

[Postcard]

Greetings from... is a postcard made in cardboard and gold foil. It frames the inscription Here / Now as it was a magnificent view, replacing the image of a possible landscape in which we feel submerged. Greetings from anywhere – in a certain moment along the axis of our existence from which we think to someone dear to us - equals a precious moment, symbolically represented by the material hand crafted by the meticulous goldsmith’s savoir faire.

Patch

Designer: Paolo UlianArtigiano: Reale Restauri

[A family of metal objects]

Patch was created as a generative system made of brass elements mostly polished, and only in some parts buffed. The elements are obtained from a flat sheet, cut so as to be able to bend some parts and be transformed into a series of three-dimensional tiles. The project has led to a series of objects generated by a patchwork of different forms that may be assembled together. Each of these objects then bears the craftsman’s signature, who embossed one of the elements by hand.

Omero, Polo, Verne

Designer: Sebastiano TonelliArtigiano: Bottega Fagnola

[Set of travel bags]

The collection of travel bags designed by Sebastiano Tonelli is born by the idea that books are undisputed travel partners. The object is considered both a container for evasions and a sort of luggage, and the designer ferries the idea toward that of a travel container. The backpack, business bag and shopping bag were named after three legendary travelers, Homer, Polo and Verne, and some of their features belong to the book world, such as the creasing, used for the folding of the rigid surface of the spine.

TESSERE - Madama, Reale, Carignano

Designer: Zanellato-BortottoArtigiano: Andrea Besana

[Series of outdoor rugs]

The encounter between Andrea Besana and Zanellato/Bortotto revealed, through a set of three outdoor carpets, the coincidence between subject and support: three buildings of Turin, Palazzo Reale, Palazzo Madama and Palazzo Carignano, ancient headquarters of the Savoy dynasty, are elevated as narrative matters and then translated into mosaic and terrazzo.The technique itself is revisited, and takes a different scale: from fixed surface, it becomes an object. The brighter colours of Murano enamels, used for architectural details such as columns, windows, entrances, porches, are juxtaposed with more saturated shades of marble and stones in order to recall the surfaces of façades.

In Primis

Designer: ZavenArtigiano: Recycled Stones

[Tables and centerpieces]

In Primis consists of two tables and a couple of centerpieces. It is a small collection, whose characteristic is given by the use of both rough (peripheral to the square-cutted stones) and smooth (obtained by sectioning the interior of the block) surfaces, pulled close by a simple tilted cut on the thickness of the plates, and subsequently joined together. Their union creates a neat use of décor. Therefore, if on the one hand the title evokes the primordial and primary concept linked to the simplicity sought in these pieces, on the other it evokes the primacy of matter and refers to the use of the first plate obtained by the blocks of stone.

K.O.

The punching bag is completely covered with gold thread trimmings signed MV1843. This precious decoration - usually used for royal coaches and uniforms - overturns the aesthetic and functional perception of the object we are used to think of: a tool which is generally associated to fitness, which evokes adrenaline and determination as well as the street’s carnality and vitality, becomes an instrument of contemplation and rare splendour. Any possible physical contact is therefore intimidating, as the punching bag puts the observer KO just by looking at it.

01100010 01100110

Their installation, which is made of a bell that freely moves in the air thanks to a tilting pole with a counterweight, plays despite the bell standing still: “A sound file is electronically transmitted to the bell, which gets excited and starts vibrating by itself, and plays its note. The sound file commands the bell with a precise impulse that cannot be avoided, and starts vibrating according to the efficiency of the material and design, the same efficiency with which it was designed for and consequently built for” (R.B.). The concept behind the object, so much hermetic, is translated by the decoration on the bell’s surface: the alternating sequence of on-off is represented by a sequence of 0 and 1, and corresponds to the visualization of the sound. A binary code that narrates the interference between physical and unphysical world, thanks to an object that is very distant from contemporary but capable of transmitting a continuous, vibrating, present time.